Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1999 06:58:31 +1000 From: "Doug Young" <dougy@gargoyle.apana.org.au> To: "Larry Hawk" <tymbrwlf@bellsouth.net> Cc: <newbies@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Experiences Message-ID: <003501bf4bf6$2483d200$827e03cb@ORACLE> References: <Pine.BSF.4.05.9912201548550.800-100000@max.alleswirdgelber> <000701bf4b1d$c76ff040$8ec101ca@bandhu> <19991221003256.D6B8E639F7@zagnut.hotpop.com> <004901bf4ba0$4bb38510$827e03cb@ORACLE> <002401bf4bc0$e0facc80$2e00040a@lhawk>
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Its like the masonic lodge ..... you need to figure out "the secret handshake" :) Like you I came from a largely Windows background and found this unix stuff impossibly obtuse .... however after messing around with linux for ages I was quite impressed with the way things are organized in "proper" unixes, particularly in respect of documentation & attitudes. The linux geeks seem to enjoy mindless complexity but at least most of the people who work with FreeBSD / Solaris / SCO etc are more practical ..... and then there's that excellent book of Greg Lehey's ...... should be compulsory reading for all newbies. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Larry Hawk" <tymbrwlf@bellsouth.net> To: <newbies@FreeBSD.ORG> Sent: Wednesday, December 22, 1999 12:37 AM Subject: Re: Experiences > My biggest frustration is with the IRC channels and some of the > newsgroups. There have been several times where I have a simple question > about something that might take someone 5 minutes to help me with and all > they can do is say "hey newbie, MAN <whatever>". It's almost like the > automatic assumption is that I DON'T try to figure something out on my own > before I ask. For example, I was having a big problem getting Samba to work > on an NT network and, as it turns out, all I needed to do was change ONE > option in my smb.conf file. It took me two weeks to figure this out on my > own, and countless beratings (sp?) from (supposed) UNIX know-it-alls. I > think that their logic is the whole "give a man a fish, feed him for a day. > teach a man to fish, feed him for life" thing. But what they seem to forget > is that everybody is a newbie at sometime and helping someone out might > actually give them a jump on something else that they're having problems > with. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise; UNIX is very complex. > I thought the whole idea of the FreeBSD community was to promote > FreeBSD, but when new folks get stuck and can't get help, then they're very > likely to just say "Screw this! Windows does what I want. I don't need this > kind of frustration!". Then you've just sent away a potential user and > they'll probably never come back and try again. Unfortunately, not every > potential FreeBSD user is a 23 year old college computer major, who hacks > code for their research paper. Most of us are competent PC users who want to > explore other alternatives besides MS. I am a NT Admin and I consider myself > pretty darn knowledgeable about PCs, but my background is 100% MS, so *NIX > is very alien to me, so I can't really draw on past experience to help me > very much. But I'm learning and I'm quite proud of my progress. > Now in all fairness, there were many people who offered to help me. And > if it weren't for them I might have given up and throw the FreeBSD CDs in > the trash, but they didn't discourage or belittle me. They tried to help and > that's were the whole "community" parts comes in. > Sorry for rambling. I just had to vent a little.... > > Larry Hawk > tymbrwlf@bellsouth.net > > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message
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